hippopotamus, horse, tiger, bear, urus (Bos primi-genius) an unknown animal of the size of a wolf, and three species of deer.  The smaller animals included the rabbit, water-rat, mouse, raven, pigeon, lark and a small type of duck.  Everything was broken into small pieces so that no single skull was found entire and it was, of course, impossible to obtain anything like a complete skeleton.  From the fact that the bones of the hyaenas themselves had suffered the same treatment as the rest we may infer that these ferocious lovers of putrid flesh were in the habit of devouring those of their own species that died a natural death, or that possibly under pressure of hunger were inclined to kill and eat the weak or diseased members of the pack.  From other evidences in the cave it is plain that its occupants were extremely fond of bones after the fashion of the South African hyaena.

[Footnote 1:  Buckland, The Rev. Wm.  “Account of an assemblage of fossil teeth and bones ... at Kirkdale.”]

[Illustration:  Jaws of Kirkdale (above) and Modern Hyaena (below).  The Kirkdale Hyaenas were evidently much more powerful than the modern ones.]

Although the existing species have jaws of huge strength and these prehistoric hyaenas were probably stronger still, it is quite improbable that they ever attacked such large animals as elephants; and the fact that the teeth found in the cave were of very young specimens seems to suggest that the hyaenas now and then found the carcase of a young elephant that had died, and dragged it piecemeal to their cave.  The same would possibly apply to some of the other large animals, for hyaenas, unless in great extremes of hunger never attack a living animal.  They have a loud and mournful howl, beginning low and ending high, and also a maniacal laugh when excited.

[Illustration:  Teeth of young Elephants found at Kirkdale.]

It might be suggested that the bones had accumulated in the den through dead bodies of animals being floated in during the inundation by the waters of the lake, but in that case the remains, owing to the narrowness of the mouth of the cave, could only have belonged to small animals, and the skeletons would have been more or less complete, and there are also evidences on many of the bones of their having been broken by teeth precisely similar to those of the hyaena.

We see therefore that in this remote age Britain enjoyed a climate which encouraged the existence of animals now to be found only in tropical regions, that herds of mammoths or straight-tusked elephants smashed their way through primaeval forests and that the hippopotamus and the woolly or small-nosed rhinoceros frequented the moist country at the margin of the lake.  Packs of wolves howled at night and terrorised their prey, and in winter other animals from northern parts would come as far south as Yorkshire.  In fact it seems that the northern and southern groups of animals in Pleistocene times appeared in this part of England at different seasons of the year and the hyaenas of Kirkdale would, in the opinion of Professor Boyd Dawkins, prey upon the reindeer at one time of the year and the hippopotamus at another.